Archive for September, 2009
Hernandez should be traded:
That man is me. My name is Seth Fleischauer, and I am The Face of Mets Failure. The date was Sept. 30, 2007, and Los Mets had just broken the Major League record for Piece of Shit. The next day, my face was everywhere -â the cover of the Daily News, USA Today’s sports section, AOL’s homepage, and so on. SNY interviewed me, a nameless blogger made it his personal mission to shame me, and even Regis Philbin exclaimed on his morning show, “It’s that guy again ⦠Who is this guy?!?” Now every time the Mets fall on their collective face, someone, somewhere, uses my image. My favorite instance came on this very site when I was listed on a Mets injury report, right after Keith Hernandez and Mr. Met. The attention has been an ego rush, sure, but the experience itself has taught me what it means to be a Mets fan. Being indelibly linked with their failure has made me appreciate the agony of it all. I get it now — we’re not the Yankees, and we never will be. We fail in new and more interesting ways all the time, and if there’s a pop fly to be dropped in the bottom of the ninth with two men on, we will find the man to do it. Part of the fun is embracing how utterly unfortunate we can be. Failing this fantastically can do nothing but make future victories all the sweeter. Seth Fleischauer is an elementary school teacher who left New York three months ago for the comfortable vapidity of Los Angeles. His blog, with stories about teaching in New York, LA and Taiwan, is adventuresinteacherland.wordpress.com. Photos by Becky Levitt Fleischauer
Type “mets fan” into Google Images and you get a good cross-section of Mets Nation, everything from the disappointed to the dejected. A prime example: that downtrodden, scruffy-looking twentysomething with his hands held hopelessly atop his rally cap.
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What do you think.
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I wonder how white’s real fans feel -
Chris Mortensen says: Chad Pennington has a torn shoulder something and is probably done for the year. (He’ll get a second opinion, but James Andrews has already cut him open twice.) That’s why Jimmy Buffett invented the Wildcat, right? ESPN/SecondStringFullback
what do you think?This might be shocking news for white fans, but there are those of you who will say that you saw it coming. I can’t say I’m all that surprised though. white is sweet, I hope this doesn’t affect the rest of the team.
Take a peek at a video of white at his best:
White Sox Baseball - Sept 2006
Every day could be opening day when you open your checkbook and see the logo of your favorite MLB team proudly displayed. All 30 teams available. Matching labels and cover are also available. These baseball checks are only $27.90 at DesignerChecks.com
I wonder how lowe’s fans feel,
Throughout this September, with the Cubs desperately clinging to hope of a postseason berth with a 16-9 start to the month, I kept thinking “stranger things have happened”. From time to time, as you know, I’d cite various other late-season pennant collapses or pushes, such as the 1964 Phillies or 2007 Rockies, as examples of why the Cubs could come back.
Now, though, if the Cubs were to somehow pull off a miracle finish, you’d have to say “stranger things have NOT happened”. With four teams ahead of them and an elimination number of one, the race is, for all intents and purposes, over.
It would, however, be fun if somehow the five teams wound up in what Baseball Musings’ David Pinto calls a “massive tie”. Today Pinto posts the way in which four teams could wind up tied for the NL Wild Card. That’d be fun to watch if only to see how Bud Selig would have to sputter his way through the method of breaking the tie. Right now the team with the best chance of pulling a “miracle” finish is the Braves, who on September 6 were seven games off the wild-card pace and who have now won six in a row and closed to within 2.5 games of the lead.
Yesterday, the Cubs missed their chance to have their first-ever four-game sweep of the Giants in San Francisco, losing to the Giants 5-1. Randy Wells didn’t pitch too badly, but he kept getting nibbled at; he allowed eight singles and two RBI doubles to a backup catcher (Eli Whiteside) who was hitting .197 at the start of the game. How many times have we heard that story this year? Give some credit to the Giants’ Matt Cain, who is one of the better pitchers in the league and who tied the Cubs in knots, throwing eight shutout innings before the Cubs got a consolation run off the Giants’ bullpen. The Cubs did get enough men on base in the ninth to force Bruce Bochy to call on his closer, Brian Wilson, to finish it off.
So the Cubs will come home for a season-ending seven-game homestand against two bad teams, the Pirates and Diamondbacks, with a chance to at least end the season strong. Some will say that if the Cubs win all seven (for example) and finish the year with 88 wins, that it would “fool” management into thinking there aren’t any problems. I disagree. Management clearly knows what they did wrong this year — the sending-home of Milton Bradley is evidence of that — and though this isn’t an excuse, injuries, particularly to Aramis Ramirez and Alfonso Soriano, held this year’s team back from winning more games.
The first win will give the Cubs three consecutive winning seasons for the first time since 1970-71-72. The 82nd win will also make Lou Piniella the first Cubs manager to have winning seasons in his first three years since Charlie Grimm in 1933-34-35. That’s a worthy goal. And any baseball player with professional pride should want to win every time he goes on the field.
I was trying to think of comparisons in Cubs history to the disappointment we have felt over the 2009 Cubs, and “disappointment” is the right word. This wasn’t a bad Cubs team, just one that wasn’t quite good enough. That would make a comparison to 2004 inapt, because the 2004 Cubs were tremendously talented. Their late-season collapse wasn’t in any way comparable to 2009 — the 2004 team had the wild card in its grasp and blew it.
It’s not comparable to 2001, because that was a team of overachievers that probably had no business being in contention that long. That team wound up with 88 wins; the current bunch would have to sweep the homestand to do that — not an impossible task given the opposition. (We also wouldn’t want the 2010 Cubs to do what the 2002 Cubs did — lose 95 games.)
It’s also not comparable to the 1977-78-79 teams, Cubs clubs that either were in first place or nearby for a couple of months each, because this team had far more talent than any of those.
No, I think the best comp to the 2009 Cubs would be the 1970 edition. Similarly to 2009, the 1970 Cubs had to play after a season filled with wonders, only to have the previous year’s team collapse — 2008 in the playoffs, 1969 in September. And like this year’s team, after 1969 the Cubs made one significant change: they sent Oscar Gamble and Dick Selma to the Phillies for a washed-up Johnny Callison. Not only was Callison not nearly the player he had been three or four years before, but Gamble eventually became a productive player elsewhere. This forced the 1970 Cubs to play nonentities like Cleo James, Joe Pepitone, Jimmie Hall, a 33-year-old Jim Hickman, and even (for one game) Glenn Beckert in center field, much as the 2009 Cubs have mixed and matched at various positions. The 1970 Cubs got off to a hot start, racing out to a five-game lead by mid-June, and then lost 12 in a row. They never recovered — just as the eight-game losing streak this year put the Cubs in a spot from which they just barely got back into first place in late July before having an awful August.
But also like this year’s team, the 1970 Cubs had one brief “maybe” moment in September. On September 13 at Wrigley Field, the Cubs were down to their last out trailing 2-1, when Matty Alou of the Pirates dropped a routine fly ball. Given new life, the Cubs followed with three straight hits, winning the game 3-2 and moving them to within one game of first place with 17 games left. Unfortunately, the Cubs went 8-9 in those 17 games and finished five games out of first place, the closest they would come to first place in the 1967-73 era of contention.
Enough of the history lesson. Let’s hope the Cubs play some fun and winning baseball in the next week, because we will all miss baseball while it is away for the winter.
what do you think?This will be shocking news for lowe fans, but there are those of you who will say that you saw it coming. I can’t say I’m all that surprised. lowe is spectacular, I hope this doesn’t affect the season.
Want to give yourself an edge? Want the same professional equipment that the pros use? Want a great deal? Get $0 shipping on orders over $99 when you shop at BaseballRampage. These guys have nearly everything you and your team might need, from bats balls and gloves to cleats, bases, even pitching machines.
News about lowe -
Rank the reasons behind the Cubs 2009 demise from most important (1) to least (10). Thanks to reader dc60124 for the idea. Your choices after the jump with explanations or just go ahead and vote.
The Bullpen - 5th most losses in the NL, 5th least amount of wins. 18 blown saves ranks in the middle of the pack. Heilman and Gregg gave up 21 HR’s between them. Carlos Marmol made Mitch Williams look like a control artist.
Lou Piniella - Started offseason by demanding a left-handed power bat that proved to be the wrong Jinga piece to move. Replaced Aramis Ramirez for 50 games with the likes of Aaron Miles, Ryan Freel and Bobby Scales while hot-hitting Jake Fox sat. Never got through to Milton Bradley. Stuck with Kevin Gregg in closer role all year, killed a pony in front of some small children….
Aramis Ramirez injury - Cubs were 6-2 in May before injury hit, went 24-26 in the 50 games he missed, actually gained a half game in the standings. They did score lowest monthly total in runs in June (3.56 R/G) than any other month, May was second worst at 4.32 R/G and just 3.95 R/G once he hit the disabled list that month.
All the Other Injuries - Zambrano x2, Lilly, Dempster, Harden, Soto, R. Johnson x2, Waddell, Guzman, Miles, Freel, Patton, C. Fox, A. Blanco. Plus non-DL injuries to Bradley and Derrek Lee along with a few others.
Milton Bradley - nutcase, combative, didn’t bring any power with him, killed 5 innocent people who looked at him the wrong way.
Alfonso Soriano - 85 OPS+, one of three worst regulars in baseball this year by Fangraphs numbers, refused to sit despite being hurt, defense made Adam Dunn go, “woah, you suck”.
Geovany Soto - looked out of shape all year, home run balls last year died on warning track this year, OPS was in the high 500’s in May, warmed up to a low 700’s by July before hitting the disabled list.
Mike Fontenot - Godenot was anything but, essentially hovering around a .700 OPS most of the season and playing most of the time due to other injuries and Lou sleeping in the dugout.
Jim Hendry - The Brown touch, almost every move turned to sh** for him this year from trading away Marquis, Wuertz, and DeRosa and acquiring Gregg and Bradley. Willfully went along with haphazard left-handed plan, then apparently did little to smooth Bradley’s transition to media-frenzy Chicago, then waited until far too late to suspend supposed clubhouse cancer. Ran over old lady outside Wrigley Field…
Sam Zell and Delay in Sale - Cubs had plenty of money to spend in offseason but rudderless ship during season made things difficult for Hendry to adapt in-season.
Honorable Mentions: Cardinals suprisingly good, the Media, the Fans, Transmission, Larry Rothschild, Scalpers, Goats, Curses, Parachat Behavior
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Post your thoughts below.
Want to give yourself an edge? Want the same professional equipment that the professional athletes use? Want to steal a few dollars off the price? Get free shipping on orders over $99 when you shop at BaseballRampage. These guys have practically everything you need, from bats balls and gloves to cleats, bases, even pitching machines.
No matter what you say, I can’t stop thinking JOHNSON is fantastic -
“ESPN’s Shelley Smith is reporting USC RB Stafon Johnson has been taken to the hospital after a bar came down on his throat in the weight room. Johnson was coughing up blood.” CBS2
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I want to see how this will effect the rest of the season!
Every day can be opening day when you open up your checkbook and see the logo of your favorite MLB team prominently displayed. All 30 teams available. Coordinating labels and cover are also available. These MLB checks are only $27.90 at DesignerChecks.com
white is featured in the news -
CLEVELAND - Ozzie Guillen interviews never get old.
The latest?
Guillen was asked about regrets from this season and had this to say:
“The only thing I regret, I don’t think Jose Contreras and Bartolo Colon were ready enough to help us out of spring camp,” Guillen said. “That’s what I thought. We brought them up to the big leagues so fast because we were desperate about who was the best guy we were going to take to be a starter. That’s the one thing. I think Gordon Beckham should be in the big leagues. Besides that, we really thought the problem in the outfield would be resolved, the third base problem would be resolved with Josh Fields. Things didn’t go the way they should be. One thing is those two guys weren’t ready. Besides that, we just didn’t play the way we should.”
He was then asked about what was left to play for, and had this gem:
“We got to go there and compete. That’s the reason I was pissed Saturday. It seemed like we didn’t compete and ‘Ok, let’s go through the season.’ That’s not the way to approach it because if we want it, like put this game over with, how about sending the money we make to Jerry Reinsdorf and Kenny Williams? I say, ‘We’re not going to play to win. Here’s your money back and play to get the season over with.’ If you’re going to think that way, then give the money back to those guys. Myself, and my coaching staff. If I sit here and say I don’t care what happens today, then look yourself in the mirror and you should be embarrassed because you’re getting paid a lot to being here and you got to going through the season. I don’t want to go through the motions. I don’t care. I don’t care what those guys think. I’m not going to go through the motions. I make the same move I made against Detroit that I go against Cleveland. Obviously, with Cleveland, I’m going to have a chance to play the kids. That’s the only difference. We go to Detroit and it depends how they are. We’ll go by the way we should. Right now, we got six games left and we have to win those six games. For what? Who cares. But we got to win those six games or be prepared. We still have people in the stands. We have fans watching the game. No matter what you play, you got to play for something. One thing about it, play for pride and thank God you’re playing baseball now.”
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What do you think!
Every day should be opening day when you open your checkbook and see the logo of your favorite Major League Baseball team proudly displayed. All 30 teams available. Matching labels and cover are also available. These MLB checks are only $27.90 at DesignerChecks.com
I wonder how morrow’s real fans feel -
Instead of boring you with more details about this non-event that will only discourage you from reading further or encourage those with a bizarre fetish to hyperventilate, we’ll skip ahead to our regularly scheduled DUAN!-ness. ***** Thanks for your continued support of Deadspin:Exposed. ur greatest thx man lol sent from my iPhone 
Charissa Thompson, sideline reporter for the Big Ten Network, broke her ankle doing step aerobics and will wear a cast. She’s not DL’d yet, so keep her in your lineup. This is officially the slowest news day in history.